Pfeiffer said she joined the "breatharian" cult under the direction of a "very controlling" couple who she described as a "kind of personal trainers" who influenced her decision making when she had first moved to Hollywood in the early 1980s. At the time she was in her early twenties.

"They worked with weights and put people on diets. Their thing was vegetarianism," Pfeiffer said. "They were very controlling. I wasn’t living with them but I was there a lot and they were always telling me I needed to come more. I had to pay for all the time I was there, so it was financially very draining."

"They believed that people in their highest state were breatharian," the actress added.

According to Pfeiffer, she did not realize she was a member of a cult until she married former husband and fellow actor Peter Horton, who at the time was researching for a role in a movie about the Unification Church, founded by Sun Myung Moon. Members of the Unification Church have traditionally been referred to by the term 'Moonies,' though it is today regarded as a pejorative by the current leaders of the church.

"We were talking with an ex-Moonie and he was describing the psychological manipulation and I just clicked," Pfeiffer told Stella magazine. "I was in one."

Pfeiffer did not reveal in the interview how she broke away from the "cult."

Pfeiffer divorced Horton in 1988 and married television writer and producer David E. Kelley, who she has two children with.

In the interview, Pfeiffer also denied having had plastic surgery, though admitted that she found aging in Hollywood to be trying and did not rule it out in the future telling the magazine that she would "never say never" with regards to surgery in the future.